Restaurantosaurus[edit]
Restaurantosaurus is a counter service restaurant in the Dinoland USA section of Disney's Animal Kingdom.
History[edit]
Restaurantosaurus opened with the rest of Disney's Animal Kingdom on April 22, 1998 [1]. When the restaurant originally opened it, along with the rest of DinoLand USA, was sponsored by McDonald's. Menu items at this time included: Dino-Sized Double Cheeseburger, Hot-Dog OSAURUS, Vegetarian Burger, Fruit Punch Gelatin, and Safari Amber (a specialty beer) [2]. For breakfast, Restaurantosaurus offered a character dining meal, "Donald’s Breakfastosaurus", which featured Donald, Goofy, Pluto and Mickey [3].
The first major change to occur at Restaurantosaurs was the end of the Donald’s Breakfastosaurus character breakfast on November 2, 2007 [4]. The end of the character breakfast coincided with the creation of a new character breakfast at Tusker House. Subsequently, McDonald's ended its sponsorship of the restaurant in 2008, and all references to the fast food company were quickly removed[1].
In 2017, Disney began offering mobile ordering at Restaurantosaurus [5].
The backstory for Restaurantosaurus, ties in with that of the rest of DinoLand USA. The story begins in 1946, in Diggs County, located somewhere along U.S. Highway 498. Here, a rustic fishing lodge was located and supported by locals and visitors alike. Nearby, Chester and Hester owned a gas station, which provided travelers with basic necessities.
In 1947 however, things changed in Diggs County. An amateur fossil-hunter found dinosaur bones near the fishing lodge, and after showing them to some paleontologists, the group decided to buy the lodge and much of its surrounding land, eventually transforming the area into the Dino Institute.
Due to the creation of the institute, professors and grad students soon flooded to the area, eventually creating a dormitory and fabricate. As a way to make a few extra bucks, the grad students decided to open their cafeteria to the public, erecting a sign atop the building that simply read "RESTAURANT".
As part of a practical joke, the students eventually began adding the suffix "osaurus" to the signs throughout Diggs County. Trying to one-up his classmates, one overachieving student added a large "osaurus" sign to the end of the "RESTAURANT" one, thus creating the name Restaurantosaurus, a name that would stick.
Click below to see Restaurantosaurus' current menu:
https://disneyworld.disney.go.com/dining/animal-kingdom/restaurantosaurus/menus/
Fun Facts and Trivia[edit]
- Inside Restaurantosaurus, guests can find sketches from "The Rite of Spring" segment of Fantasia [6].
- A photo found inside the restaurant shows Walt with the Audio Animatronic dinosaurs from the Ford Magic Skyway pavilion at the 1964 World's Fair[6].
- The paintings in Restaurantosaurus were done by Imagineer Joe Rohde. The largest of which is a tribute to paleo artist Charles Knight [7].
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 https://d23.com/a-to-z/restaurantosaurus/
- ↑ http://www.yesterland.com/mcwdw.html
- ↑ http://www.charactercentral.net/L68_DisneyCharacters_WaltDisneyWorld_AnimalKingdom_DonaldsBreakfastosaurusatRestaurantosaurus.aspx
- ↑ http://blog.touringplans.com/2007/05/20/donalds-breakfastosaurus-to-end/
- ↑ http://www.wdwmagic.com/other/mymagicplus/news/16aug2017-mobile-order-rollout-complete-with-the-final-restaurants-at-disneys-hollywood-studios.htm
- ↑ 6.0 6.1 6.2 http://land.allears.net/blogs/jackspence/2012/10/animal_kingdoms_restaurantosau.html
- ↑ Joe Rohde shared this information on his Instagram account https://www.instagram.com/p/B_AT5jkn9lB/
